Recent developments on multiscale simulations for rheology and complex flow of polymers

Abstract This review summarized the multiscale simulation (MSS) methods for polymeric liquids. Since polymeric liquids have multiscale characteristics of monomeric, mesoscopic, and macroscopic flow scales, MSSs that relate different hierarchical levels are adequate to reproduce flow properties accurately. Our review includes pioneering studies to the most advanced MSS studies on rheology predictions and flow simulations of polymeric liquids. We discuss two major types of MSS methods: the bottom-up and model-embedded MSS methods. The former method mainly connects all-atom molecular dynamics models and mesoscopic models to predict rheological properties. In contrast, the latter method, where a microscopic or mesoscopic model is embedded in a macroscopic computational domain, is designed to predict macroscopic flow properties. Finally, we also discuss MSS methods using machine learning techniques. Graphical abstract